Home Gave Aid to ClergyCherry Valley: The Site, Now Closed, Helped Priests Suffering from Pedophilia and Depression

By Steve Moore
Press Enterprise [Riverside, CA]
June 3, 2002

Cherry Valley — A retirement home for Catholic priests, including ones who had
been accused of sexual abuse, operated in rural Cherry Valley
for about 20 years until it closed last year.

Our Lady of Guadalupe Retreat helped priests suffering from
pedophilia, chronic depression and the effects of old age. It
attracted little notice in this unincorporated community of 5,000
in the hills overlooking Beaumont where people mind their business
and tend their horses and fruit orchards.

The Servants of the Paraclete, a religious group that works with
troubled clerics, put the property up for sale after closing it in
June 2001 to consolidate operations.

At times, 10 priests lived at the retreat after being sent there
by a diocese or religious order.

• • •

Some priests resist

Some priests from the Diocese of San Bernardino accused of sexual
abuse balked at going to the retreat or found its treatment
ineffective.

In 1993, Father Anthony Garduno denied an allegation that, while
serving at St. Edward Catholic Church in Corona, he asked a man to
strip and show his genitals during a pre-marriage counseling
session. He was never charged with a crime.

Garduno left the diocese and went to live with his father instead
of staying at the retreat.

Garduno, who visited the facility, said many priests there were
depressed and no longer active in the ministry. And he didn't care
for the resort atmosphere.

"You go there and disappear," Garduno said. "They would phase you
out. I didn't want to spend the rest of my life doing nothing."
Garduno, 44, said he wanted to get on with his spiritual life. He
is now monsignor at the Our Lady of Tepeyac Church in the
unincorporated community of Home Gardens west of Riverside and near
Corona. He said the church incorporates American Indian ritual and
belongs to a Free Catholic denomination that allows priests to marry.

The Rev. Rudi Gil said he attended the retreat for "sexual
identity" issues in 1993 after he resigned as pastor of St.
Frances of Rome Catholic Church in Lake Elsinore amid allegations
he had molested a teen-age boy. The Rev. Howard Lincoln, spokesman
for the San Bernardino Diocese [see correction], has said [see
correction] Gil admitted during counseling that he sexually abused
a child, though Gil has never been criminally prosecuted.

Gil said a psychologist worked with him and one other priest for
an hour or two each day, but Gil said he left the center after
about two weeks because he believed the treatment was ineffective.

• • •

One priest sought money

One priest who came and stayed was the Rev. Joseph L. Clauss of
Evansville, Ind., accused of pedophilia. Clauss lived there for
eight years until it closed. While staying at the retreat,
Clauss wrote parishioners in Indiana and offered to celebrate
Mass for money, according to an Indiana newspaper, the
Evansville Courier & Press. The newspaper said Clauss also
sought donations for mission work he said he was doing on the
nearby Morongo Indian Reservation.

Morongo tribal spokeswoman Waltona Manion said several tribal
leaders said they had not heard of Clauss or any missionary work
being done by him on the reservation.

"We feel like we've been deceived," said Margaret Gross of
Evansville, who found letters sent by Clauss to her mother,
according to the newspaper.

The Courier & Press said Evansville Bishop Gerald Gettelfinger
announced that he will visit Clauss at the Servants of the
Paraclete's New Mexico retreat, where Clauss now lives, to discuss
allegations that Clauss solicited money from former parishioners.

Several calls to Clauss, 71, at the New Mexico retreat were not
returned.

• • •

Use of retreats questioned

The 15-acre Cherry Valley complex has a half-dozen separate
houses, a main hall and a swimming pool. It is valued at about
$ 796,000, according to Riverside County assessor's records.

Lincoln said the diocese considered buying the facility as a
possible retreat or priest retirement center, but didn't make an
offer.

The Roman Catholic Church's use of such retreats as a haven for
priests accused of sexual abuse has been questioned by church
critics.

Psychiatrists at the Institute of Living in Hartford, Conn., one
of a handful of treatment centers that specialize in treating
clergy, have accused the Archdiocese of Boston of disregarding
their advice against putting priests back into positions where they
have access to "vulnerable populations."

The retired priests living in Cherry Valley posed no danger to
the surrounding community, said a spokesman for the Servants of the
Paraclete.

"These men were not going any place, they did not participate in
any public ministry," said Father Raymond Gunzel.

That was not the case at the Servants of the Paraclete's New
Mexico retreat, where priests accused of being pedophiles were
allowed to work in area parishes. Nearly 200 lawsuits alleging
child sexual abuse were filed against the Archdiocese of Santa Fe
beginning in 1990. Gunzel said priests at the New Mexico retreat
are no longer allowed to return to parish work.

The former Cherry Valley retreat sits at the end of a cul-de-sac
in the 39000 block of Orchard Street.

"I was told that it was a place for 'wayward priests' with
alcohol problems," she said. "But I never saw anybody there, it was
a very quiet place, very obscure.

"I doubt many people knew it was a place for pedophiles."

Correction: A story in Monday's newspaper about a former Cherry Valley counseling center for Catholic priests accused of sexual abuse incorrectly attributed information about the Rev. Rudi Gil. Gil said in an interview that he had admitted during counseling that he sexually abused a teen-age boy.